On This Day: President Obama attends a meeting in the Roosevelt Room of the White House, Jan. 28, 2013 (Pete Souza)

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Today:

9:0 EST: President Obama delivers the State of the Union address

Wednesday: President Obama will deliver remarks on the economy at a Costco store in Lanham, Maryland. In the afternoon, he will travel to Pennsylvania for a speech at the U.S. Steel Irvin Plant in West Mifflin. He then travels to the Milwaukee area to spend the night.

Thursday: The President will speak in the Milwaukee (General Electric’s Waukesha Gas Engines facility in Waukesha) and Nashville areas before returning to the White House.

Friday: The President will take a “virtual national tour” via questions from Internet users nationwide during a Google+ Hangout.

Raising the federal minimum wage should, in theory, be fairly easy. The policy enjoys overwhelming public support; economists have told policymakers an increase would give the economy a boost; and President Obama has made this a top policy priority.

But legislative efforts are stuck: congressional Republicans, many of whom are on record wanting to lower the minimum wage to zero, remain fiercely opposed to the measure and there’s no reason to think they’ll budge anytime soon.

The White House obviously can’t change federal law without Congress, but Obama has figured out how to give a whole lot of workers a raise – whether Republicans like it or not.

Greg Sargent: In using executive authority, Obama is on solid political ground

The big news: Obama will announce in tonight’s speech that he will use executive authority to boost the minimum wage for employees of federal contractors. So he’s serious about going around Congress to move his agenda and spur the recovery. It’s fair to ask what took Obama so long to realize he had little other recourse, but either way, we’re now heading for a major battle over use of that authority.

Republicans are already denouncing the planned executive actions, arguing it will make compromise between the two parties harder. But again, Republicans have openly confirmed they deliberately denied support for Obama’s agenda explicitly to make it harder for him to claim he’d bridged differences between the parties. Seriously, Mitch McConnell has publicly admitted this.

Jonathan Chait: Obama’s Plan to End Discrimination Against the Long-term Unemployed

In his State of the Union address, President Obama will announce that some of the largest firms in the United States have signed a pledge not to discriminate in hiring against the long-term unemployed, reports The Wall Street Journal. This is an interesting and creative response to the most vexing repercussion of the economic crisis: millions of workers who have lost their jobs and cannot find work precisely because they have don’t have it.

The crisis of mass unemployment can be thought of as two problems, one of which is normal, and the other of which is not. The normal problem is simply a standard, albeit very large, recession. The basic policy response is for the government to stimulate demand through low interest rates and fiscal stimulus to create more jobs. Since congressional Republicans (and deficit scolds) are imposing contractionary fiscal policy, Obama has no viable fiscal solution.

TPM: New GOP Plan Makes Everything They Hate About Obamacare Even Worse

For the last couple months, the Republican critique of Obamacare has been founded on President Barack Obama’s broken promise: “If you like your health plan, you can keep it.” It was a pledge that the health care reform law wouldn’t disrupt the existing insurance system, that those satisfied with the status quo would be protected from any unwanted intrusion.

It’s been an effective line of attack, given the sinking approval ratings for both Obama and his eponymous insurance expansion. Which makes the new GOP alternative to Obamacare, proposed Monday by three Republican senators, a bit baffling. Because the bill seems to based on another fundamental disruption of the individual insurance market — and on top of that, it could upend the employer insurance universe, through which most Americans receive health coverage, forcing many to either pay more or lose their coverage.

ThinkProgress: The Five Worst Things About The New Republican Proposal To Replace Obamacare

On Monday, a trio Republican senators unveiled an alternative to Obamacare eerily similar to the one that former presidential candidate Mitt Romney proposed in 2012. The plan boils down to a rehash of boilerplate conservative ideas for “market-oriented” and “consumer-driven” health care reform — code words that really mean deregulating the insurance industry and forcing consumers to shoulder a larger burden of their health care costs.

Here are the five most troubling aspects about the new proposal from Sens. Tom Coburn (OK), Orrin Hatch (UT), and Richard Burr (NC), dubbed the Patient Choice, Affordability, Responsibility, and Empowerment (CARE) Act….

Congress’ farm bill has traditionally been one of the easier pieces of legislation to pass. Democrats tend to like the provisions that help feed low-income Americans; Republicans tend to like the elements that extend subsidies to agribusinesses; and the result is a package that sails through the House and Senate without much fuss.

But as congressional Republican moved further to the right, the farm bill stopped being easy. In this Congress, for example, House GOP lawmakers voted to slash public investment in food aid to the poor, cutting $39 billion over the next decade, resulting in lost benefits for about 3.8 million people.

…. This was bound to happen at some point in this ongoing saga: the name of an American agent has been leaked to the public via a document stolen by Edward Snowden….

The public relies upon these reporters to accurately translate the techno-heavy information in the Snowden documents for the benefit of the debate. How can we be sure that this sort of epic blunder won’t happen again? Indeed, as more reporters gain access to Snowden’s documents, the likelihood only increases.

As for Snowden, rather than choosing very specific files which he deemed to be in the public interest, then carefully vetting every detail, he chose to indiscriminately dump the documents into the world, trusting that reporters will figure it all out and do the right thing. While no one’s perfect and we all make mistakes, this is high stakes material and there’s simply no room for errors like this.

Do you remember this emotional moment from last year’s State of the Union Address?

“Gabby Giffords deserves a vote. The families of Newtown deserve a vote. The families of Aurora deserve a vote. The families of Oak Creek and Tucson and Blacksburg, and the countless other communities ripped open by gun violence — they deserve a simple vote. They deserve a simple vote.” – President Obama

I was there with Gabby, sitting in the First Lady’s box. We watched as the chamber rose to its feet as one — both sides of the aisle, divided on so many important issues, but unified in that moment.

One year later, that same body has done what was unthinkable on that night … nothing at all.

On the eve of this year’s State of the Union, add your voice to Gabby’s and mine and tell Congress “It’s too dangerous to wait” any longer on gun violence. Sign our petition here

Four weeks into 2014 and there have already been eight school shootings in fifteen school days: South Carolina State, Purdue University, Albany High School and several others.

It’s too dangerous to wait, and it’s too important for us to be silent.

US folk singer and activist Pete Seeger, whose songs included Turn! Turn! Turn! and If I Had A Hammer, has died at the age of 94. He died at a New York hospital after a short illness, his grandson said.

Seeger gained fame in The Weavers, formed in 1948, and continued to perform in his own right in a career spanning six decades.

Renowned for his protest songs, Seeger was blacklisted by the US Government in the 1950s for his leftist stance.

Denied broadcast exposure, Seeger toured US college campuses spreading his music and ethos, later calling this the “most important job of my career”.

Another insane cold wave — not the infamous “polar vortex ” but its evil twin — is bringing sub-zero and single-digit temperatures to much of the nation. And global warming may be even more extreme, and potentially more catastrophic, than climate scientists had feared.

This is, of course, no contradiction. The rallying cry of the denialists — “It’s really cold outside, so global warming must be a crock!” — can be taken seriously only by those with a toddler’s limited conception of time and space. They forget that it’s winter, and apparently they don’t quite grasp that even when it’s cold in one part of the world, it can be hot in another.

President Obama wipes his face with a cloth handed to him by White House Butler Von Everett in the Blue Room of the White House following an event with business leaders in the East Room, Jan. 28, 2009 (Photo by Pete Souza)

President Obama and VP Biden speak with service members, Jan. 28, 2008, during their first visit to the Pentagon as President and VP

Photo by Pete Souza

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President Obama walks across the South Lawn of the White House, while onlookers welcome his arrival from Marine One, Jan. 28, 2010, following a day trip to Tampa, Fla. (Photo by Pete Souza)

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President Obama watches a televised speech by President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt in the Outer Oval Office, Jan. 28, 2011. With the President, from left, are: Tony Blinken, National Security Advisor to the Vice President; Deputy National Security Advisor Denis McDonough; and Press Secretary Robert Gibbs (Photo by Pete Souza)

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President Obama stands with LeBron James, Dwayne Wade and coach Erik Spoelstra as he honors the NBA champions Miami Heat basketball team in the East Room at the White House, Jan. 28, 2013

-14 degrees in my neck of the wood. Truck started yesterday and Today, Nada. Stuck waiting for AAA jump for over 2 hours now. So. Stuck and frustrated. Home probably and Alone getting really angry. Oh well. At least, No Snow until tomorrow.

Now I can go back catch up at TOD and read mostly while I wait for a Jump Truck to come. Enough of my Rant this AM.

Al Jazeera America, instead of informing its citizens about the realities of getting complex legislation through a deliberately obstructionist congress, is having an emoprog-”Dear Mr. President” fest. This entails having people write their latest complaint du jour on signs, which they want PBO to magically solve, and posing for camera with those signs. And of course, making them think that a single SOTU speech will address and/or solve their problems.

That is the kind of “activism” that Al Jazeera America is now promoting. NOTHING about the 2014 midterms coming up; NOTHING about helping to get more progressive citizens elected into congress; NOTHING about REAL activism that will improve the lives of the vast majority of ordinary Americans. All a bunch of childish demands that call for endless griping, sniping, finger-pointing (at PBO only), without the responsibility of having to lift a finger or hold others accountable. Most of the people holding those signs do not strike me as average, every day Americans with legitimate concerns. They strike me as paid activists working for various front groups.

The same Al Jazeera on their “America Tonight” show is featuring Roland Martin (of all people) to TELL PBO that he should be more of a community organizer and less of a politician at his SOTU tonight. Can someone tell me a single thing that Martin has done which has evolved into meaningful policy or legislation?

This kind of nonsense coming from the so-called “left” media is just as damaging as the crap we we see on the right.

Then have the CBC criticizing Obama for not picking enough Afr-Americans for certain posts (or something).
Always complaining.
Never helping the cause.
And this is why we are in the mess we are in now – because they did nothing but whine all through 2009-2010. This led to the GOP winning the House AND enabled them to redraw district maps which secures their majority for many years to come.

I wish I could say that I am surprised at the over the top negative spin that the media has been projecting toward this administration leading up to this SOTU. “He needs a re-set”, “This is his last opportunity”, “Can he rebound”. The gloom that has been used by our media toward this man is beyond the pale.

We could sit here and in 5 minutes list of all the things that he has done to save this country from total disaster but according to the media he gets zero credit for any of it. Republicans obstructing is just a way of life that can’t have an ounce of impact on the failure to get things accomplished in DC according to them. Nothing to see here, let’s move right along to blaming PBO….

Happy SOTU day! I’m planning on getting comfy and turning the TV on at just the moment our pres enters! or watch online i suppose… and then promptly turn it off right after our pres is done speaking so as to not suffer even one moment of chatting head nonsense. can’t wait!

also, too, just imagine if PBO had a congress that actually worked hard to make america better? he could have done so much more from his SOTU list last year. we really need to finish strong in 2014! In a perfect world the GOP in congress would be tried and convicted of treason.

My husband and me are doing it up big – we’re ordering a rib feast, we’re gonna set up all three laptops and desktops so we can watch and live tweet. I want to tweet my joy, my support and respond to any negative comments about my beloved PBO and first family. Also, I wanted to mention you can watch the pre-event action on C-SPAN. They televise absent the FOX HATE NEWS commentary.

Twenty-five years after the Ronald Reagan era ended, Democrats are anxious to move past his conservative vision that is premised on the evils of government. The mentality has continued to permeate the national debate even as Republicans have lost four out of the last six presidential elections, aided by a Democratic Party that has admittedly ceded it too much ideological ground.

No more, they say. The American economy remains in a slump, middle class incomes have stagnated, social mobility is in decline and income inequality has soared to unprecedented heights. Democrats’ prescriptions to heal these wounds were again thwarted by Republicans in Congress last year despite their defeat in the 2012 election. If Democrats can’t make a compelling case for government to play a larger role in solving these problems now, then when?

It’ll be a crucial subtext of President Barack Obama’s sixth State of the Union speech Tuesday night. A desire to fight back against the Reagan-era mentality, which is alive and thriving in the modern tea party movement, was also the subject of a lengthy speech last week by Sen. Chuck Schumer of New York, the third-ranked Democrat.

Every time PBO does one of these big speeches I have a mess of a time calming my nerves. It’s like one of my own is about to perform and I want him to do so well that I get myself all riled up. I am confident that he will be his usual wonderful self and I’ll go through my ritual of going into a quiet place and saying a little prayer not so much for him as much as for the people who hear him. That they allow themselves to be open to the truth. It’s a tall order for some in this country but I’ll keep trying in my own little way to help them see the light.

My son kids me when I say “Barack Obama is like my other son” by adding “and you like him better.” But I know what you mean by your “It’s like one of my own is about to perform” – especially since “my own” and his chair once fell backwards off a stage riser with his baritone horn on top of him during an otherwise lovely sixth-grade concert. Kinda like this guy (and I share this only to calm your nerves – ’cause he’s a Republican and this would NEVER happen to “our own” PBO):

I totally hear you because PBO is our heart, our love nugget, the best President EVAR!! Every slight, every lie, every emoprog episode, is felt deeply by all of us who love and support him. Yes I understand completely.

I used to have the fundraiser gift photos of the First Family in frames in my livingroom. My kids complained that they should be there. I told them their own photos were in every other room of my house so they were not cheated.

Donna, I expressed much the same feelings in this morning’s Early Bird Chat. I get very nervous on his big speech or debate days, exactly as if a member of my family were in the spotlight. This is not based on any doubt about him, but on my own overwhelming desire to have him universally recognized as the great president he is. We have so many people in this country that close their ears and shut their eyes to him. We have to give him the extra prayers and supports he needs to make up for these naysayers. I’ll be joining you in prayer before the speech.

How proud and happy Ted Kennedy would be to see millions signing up for Obamacare and to see gays and lesbians openly serving in the military and gaining their right to be married. And how he would chide his fellow Congresspersons for their obstructionism. In that mellifluous oratorical voice I can easily imagine him speaking truth to power.

And how pleased he would be to see the next-generation Elizabeth Warren carrying on his vision for Massachusetts and for America. And to see his beloved niece, Caroline, serving as ambassador to Japan.

His powerful dreams continue on in the next generation of dreamers-and-doers.

Oh, Chips, too funny. The photo where “President Obama wipes his face with a cloth handed to him by White House Butler Von Everett in the Blue Room of the White House following an event with business leaders in the East Room” made me laugh “so bad” (as my toddler great grandson would say!). If he wipes his face with a cloth after meeting with business leaders, what does he do after meeting with a gaggle of Republican elected officials? Probably they bring out one of those instant standalone get-these-bad-chemicals-off-me showers or somethin’.

Playing it forward, I had the same thought about the caring and nurturing man, and the fact our President sees him as a peer and fellow public servant. (I had to stop myself from using examples here of some who haven’t, so as not to further mess up our minds with riffraff on this SOTU morning.)

The Governor of Kentucky will be sitting with the First Lady at the SOTU tonight. Also Antoinette Tuff, she is the lady who talk that suspect who came to a school in Atlanta with a gun and she talk him into not harming anyone and turning himself in she will be sitting with the First Lady. How cool for Ms. Tuff, she talked about having troubles, how her husband walked out on her, she tried to kill herself, but look at her now. Meeting the President and First Lady. The Lord is good.

WASHINGTON (AP) — House Speaker John Boehner (BAY’-nur) says President Barack Obama likely has the authority to raise the minimum wage for new federal contract workers. But the speaker warned against any other unilateral steps that could encroach on the Constitution.

Boehner told reporters at a Capitol Hill news conference Tuesday that a unilateral increase in the minimum wage is bad policy that will cost low-income Americans their jobs. He says that will hurt the people the president intends to help.

The Ohio Republican said the GOP will be watching Obama to ensure he doesn’t exceed his authority with other executive actions. Boehner said the president took an oath to obey the tenets of the Constitution.

Pressed on what steps Republicans might take, Boehner said there are unspecified options that the GOP will discuss at their annual retreat this week.

Oh dear, the speaker in name only couldn’t even provide a couple of examples off the top of his head? It’s not that complicated. So the American people should stay tuned for some as yet ‘unspecified options’. Ok GOP — DISCUSS.

(Bo’-nurd) He should count his blessings to hear the sound of ‘bo’ in his name, eh?? Seems we are getting through to people if AP is compelled to try and insert the ‘correct pronunciation’ of ugly man’s name! 😆

President Obama said Seeger, who died Monday at the age of 94, helped “strike blows for worker’s rights and civil rights.”

Once called “America’s tuning fork,” Pete Seeger believed deeply in the power of song. But more importantly, he believed in the power of community – to stand up for what’s right, speak out against what’s wrong, and move this country closer to the America he knew we could be. Over the years, Pete used his voice – and his hammer – to strike blows for worker’s rights and civil rights; world peace and environmental conservation. And he always invited us to sing along. For reminding us where we come from and showing us where we need to go, we will always be grateful to Pete Seeger. Michelle and I send our thoughts and prayers to Pete’s family and all those who loved him.

We Shall Overcome is a protest song that became a key anthem of the African-American Civil Rights Movement (1955–1968). The title and structure of the song are derived from an early gospel song, “I’ll Overcome Someday”, by African-American composer Charles Albert Tindley. The song was published as “We Will Overcome” in the Sept. 1948 issue of People’s Songs Bulletin (a publication of People’s Songs, an organization of which Pete Seeger was the director and guiding spirit).

Thanks for the education. While waiting for AAA service this AM, CBS or ABC had said that We Shall Over Come as I hear it today was written by Pete Seeger. I should not have trusted the report. Thanks.

Good Morning my Chips and TOD family. A beautiful day to our Danny also.(((((Love you, Danny))))))). Our POTUS will be fine tonight. Just keep good thoughts, beautiful meditations of goodness in your spaces and hope and pray for the very best of wisdom. He feels our goodness coming into his space. FLOTUS and the girls will keep his space beautiful at home.

Relax, be good to your space, and leave out the negative elements of the pundits. They do not deserve any room in your space or our wonderful POTUS. POB will keep his space focused on the long haul. So let us all take hold and help him make it across the finish line.

We Will Do Our Best To Make This Journey a Good One For All. As Bobfr always reminds us ” #ForwardTogether.”HZ

What a beautiful thought, Layla. If I were an artist, I’d get out my easel and start on a portrait showing all of our wings around him, and try to do justice to that figurative portrait you just softly painted for our minds.

Who needs wine or other spirits! We can lift ourselves up quite nicely right here on TOD with our love and admiration for him.

Thank you, HZ, dear one! All these ‘nerves’ may be soothed by remembering another fave from bobfr: “#trustbarack”. After all, when has he ever NOT knocked it out of the ballpark? This year will only be better than ever!

Mark Knoller shilling for his GOP friends….notice so far that no one in the MSM has questioned the GOP’s plan to have 3 or 4 separate responses to PBO’s SOTU. NO ONE, not even from the so-called left. If it were the other way around, that’s all the media would be focused on – how the Dems are in disarray, how they can’t even agree on one rebuttal, how the Republican President has them in chaos, etc.

We will undoubtedly hear some crocodile tears for the poor and jobless tonight from two women in the so called GOP establishment wing. The burning question is, what have been the GOP POLICIES relating to the poor and the American people for the last five years and before. No food stamps, no UI, no minimum wage, no contraceptives, no abortions, no infrastructure, no voting, no healthcare, no regulations, no to climate change, no to the EPA, no to immigration, no to gun safety, no to taxes on the 1%, no to raising the debt limit, no, no, no. But yes to vaginal probes, yes to Benghazi lies and distortions, yes to corporate welfare, yes to ALEC, yes to the Koch Brothers, yes to repealing Obamacare, yes to a government shutdown, yes to dangerous XL pipeline, yes to filibusters, yes to delays, yes to obstruction. YES, TO SAYING NO TO PRESIDENT OBAMA.

LOL! Msnbc can’t stop talking about that poll they had. About how awful the SOTU is and what a crappy job the President is doing.
Exactly what the RNC wanted… Chuck Todd’s poll and msnbc push of this poll every segment, is borderline smear swift boating, Rovian politics.
It makes the public not waht to watch tonight, which is what the Msnbc meme of the day is. Hmm!

PBO and his team have made sure that the American people can access his speech by other means and they will! Hence the narrative re nobody will be watching..on TV and the numbers will reflect that, Then media can say ‘we told you so’!

CRAZY doesn’t begin to describe her. This woman, as a state legislator, was beyond comprehension. Hiding in the bushes at the Capitol. Hiding in Elevators. Saying the most offensive things. Her husband picks her clothes and tells her what to do. GOD, she claims speaks to her, but ONLY through her husband. The woman is messed up. Only Dist 6 in MN could produce such a bat poop.